Monday, June 21, 2010

All through the night I'll be watching over youAnd all through the night I'll be standing over youAnd through bad dreams I'll be right there babytelling you everything's going to be alrightWhen you cry I'll be there babytelling you were never nothing less than beautifulSo don't you worryI'm your angel standing by

Friday, June 18, 2010

A bag of tricks—is it? And a game smoothies play? If you’re good with a deck of cards or rolling the bones—that helps? If you can tell jokes and be a chum and make an impression—that helps? When boy meets girl or girl meets boy— what helps? They all help: be cozy but not too cozy: be shy, bashful, mysterious, yet only so-so: then forget everything you ever heard about love for it’s a summer tan and a winter windburn and it comes as weather comes and you can’t change it: it comes like your face came to you, like your legs came and the way you walk, talk, hold your head and hands— and nothing can be done about it—you wait and pray. Is there any way of measuring love? Yes but not till long afterward when the beat of your heart has gone many miles, far into the big numbers. Is the key to love in passion, knowledge, affection? All three—along with moonlight, roses, groceries, givings and forgivings, gettings and forgettings, keepsakes and room rent, pearls of memory along with ham and eggs. Can love be locked away and kept hid? Yes and it gathers dust and mildew and shrivels itself in shadows unless it learns the sun can help, snow, rain, storms can help— birds in their one-room family nests shaken by winds cruel and crazy— they can all help: lock not away your love nor keep it hid. How comes the first sign of love? In a chill, in a personal sweat, in a you-and-me, us, us two, in a couple of answers, an amethyst haze on the horizon, two dance programs criss-crossed, jackknifed initials interwoven, five fresh violets lost in sea salt, birds flying at single big moments in and out a thousand windows, a horse, two horses, many horses, a silver ring, a brass cry, a golden gong going ong ong ong-ng-ng, pink doors closing one by one to sunset nightsongs along the west, shafts and handles of stars, folds of moonmist curtains, winding and unwinding wisps of fogmist.

How long does love last? As long as glass bubbles handled with care or two hot-house orchids in a blizzard or one solid immovable steel anvil tempered in sure inexorable welding— or again love might last as six snowflakes, six hexagonal snowflakes, six floating hexagonal flakes of snow or the oaths between hydrogen and oxygen in one cup of spring water or the eyes of bucks and does or two wishes riding on the back of a morning wind in winter or one corner of an ancient tabernacle held sacred for personal devotions or dust yes dust in a little solemn heap played on by changing winds. There are sanctuaries holding honey and salt. There are those who spill and spend. There are those who search and save. And love may be a quest with silence and content. Can you buy love? Sure every day with money, clothes, candy, with promises, flowers, big-talk, with laughter, sweet-talk, lies, every day men and women buy love and take it away and things happen and they study about it and the longer they look at it the more it isn’t love they bought at all: bought love is a guaranteed imitation.

Can you sell love? Yes you can sell it and take the price and think it over and look again at the price and cry and cry to yourself and wonder who was selling what and why. Evensong lights floating black night water, a lagoon of stars washed in velvet shadows, a great storm cry from white sea-horses— these moments cost beyond all prices.

Bidden or unbidden? how comes love? Both bidden and unbidden, a sneak and a shadow, a dawn in a doorway throwing a dazzle or a sash of light in a blue fog, a slow blinking of two red lanterns in river mist or a deep smoke winding one hump of a mountain and the smoke becomes a smoke known to your own twisted individual garments: the winding of it gets into your walk, your hands, your face and eyes.

"Another Nail in My Heart" oil on panel 8"x20"Galkyd medium mixed with burnt umber paint applied with a rag.Drawing done with burnt umber paint and a sable brush. I wiped out the lights with a rag and some paint thinner.Galkyd and thin washy layer of main colors and values. Then I let it tack up or dry just a bit. Galkyd medium speeds the drying and makes a nice stable underpainting.Thicker layers of paint and then working out subtle stuff with some sable brushes.The finished painting.PURCHASE

Sunday, June 13, 2010

This is a page from "Wolverine" comics that I did a painting of in oil. I'm including the actual page that it was painted from. I'm just indulging my inner child wanting to not so secretly be a comic book artist. This is oil on Masonite panel and the size (20"x16")

Monday, June 7, 2010

Here's a step by step of a painting I did today. I've already posted it for sale on Etsy for $130. Please visit my page:http://www.etsy.com/shop/kmencher

Here's the underdrawing. I did with a 30% grey marker. Next, I coated the canvas with burnt umber.Next I wiped out the light areas with a q-tip and a rag.Next I rested the darks with more burnt umber mixed with a touch of lamp black.The rest of the painting was done with a palette of cadmium yellow, cadmium orange, and white.

I'm a fine artist and an art historian. I'm
always looking for interesting art historical facts and ideas. I also
like reading and fiction so every once in a while I have fiction
contests where I give away original art.

I grew up in NYC but now in live the San Francisco Bay area. Where I make art, teach, curate, and blog.